


Intravenous

by orphan_account



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Baby Rosie doesn’t exist, Drug Abuse, Drug Use, Fighting, Internal Conflict, John and Mary divorced, Lonely Sherlock, M/M, Past Drug Addiction, Possible Spoilers, drug overdose
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-07
Updated: 2018-05-07
Packaged: 2019-05-03 17:09:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,326
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14573646
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Sherlock was sitting at chair he normally sat in playing the violin, but this time he was slumped and not moving.John peered his pale blue eyes to the side table next to Sherlock, and saw a vial of morphine, and a syringe.





	Intravenous

After a long day at the surgery, all John wanted to do was lie down, have a bite to eat, and call it a night.

Running around with Sherlock all day and night and helping the sick is an extremely tiring job, especially since his detective work with Sherlock didn’t pay squat.

Merely the satisfaction of helping those in need was enough reparation for John Watson. He had enough money to live with his close friend at the heart of London and live life on the edge.

John picked up the takeaway from the Chinese restaurant around the corner, and walked into his flat, sneaking past Mrs Hudson.

Mrs. Hudson was a wonderful woman of course, but her overbearing aptitude and inclination to talk just a little bit too much, was enough to make John a little wary.

He padded up the narrow carpeted hardwood steps to their flat and his heart dropped, shattering into a million pieces.

Leaving for work that morning felt a little odd, like the feeling John would get before something horrible would happen on a case. Or, like the time Sherlock y’know... died for a little while.

Sherlock was sitting at chair he normally sat in playing the violin, but this time he was slumped and not moving.

“Sherlock!” John yelled, shaking the taller man to regain his consciousness.

John peered his pale blue eyes to the side table next to Sherlock, and saw a vial of morphine, and a syringe.

The room for him was spinning, nearly sending him to the floor. He felt like he was a fish stuck inside a small fishbowl, only he couldn’t breathe underwater. He felt as if water engulfed him, spilling into his lungs.

With a quick thought, he slapped Sherlock, awakening him at a jump.

“J-john..n..? Mm.. what are y’ doing here...?” He slurred. His eyes were slits, opening and closing slowly and not looking directly into John’s enraged glare.

“You absolute prick. What the hell is the matter with you?!” John spat. His blood was boiling, and he could feel his veins protruding and his skin reddening at every breath.

“Iss for a case...” Sherlock mumbled and threw his hands to his lap. Sherlock was too drugged up to care and definitely didn’t care about the lie he told John.

Sherlock had been on and off drugs, with a love hate relationship. There was that one time he stayed in an abandoned building living with druggies and shooting up heroin, and he was also addicted to cigarettes.

Sherlock once tore through the flat like a tornado trying to find his cigarettes that John hid. Since didn’t find them, he resorted to sneaking into Bart’s and stealing a bottle of 7% strength nicotine solution. 

He prided himself on being clean for so long, but he couldn’t take the pressure anymore. With John being a newly wed, and moving out of the apartment, the only solution to his solace was his long time friend. Morphine.

He’d been given morphine in the hospital when Mary shot him point blank in the chest, and had snuck a few vials of it when his nurses and doctors weren’t paying attention. He expertly distracted the nurses by using his masterful deduction skills and pissing them off. 

The morphine allowed him to hold the truth from John— about Mary.  
Over the months in his lonesome he’d become addicted to it, addicted to the happiness it gave him in replacement for the happiness John gave him before he left.

John was back now, after the scandal that had unfurled around Mary and her involvement in some risqué government operations. He signed the divorce papers, and that was that.

However for Sherlock, his addiction to drugs wasn’t just as simple as signing a paper and parting ways with the substance. He had horrible withdrawals and vomiting spells. He wasn’t willing to give it up.

“Dear god, let me get my stethoscope.” John said, huffing anxiously and rushing to the closet where he kept his instruments.

“M fine, John. Please. ‘S all good.” Sherlock said, persuading John to drop the conversation.

“Are you bloody serious? I’m giving you an examination and then we’re going to A&E to get you Narcan.” John said, pacing at Sherlock.

He was trying to bite back his anger, and prevent himself from going absolutely mad and beating the life out of him.

The doctor wrapped a blood pressure cuff and placed a stethoscope underneath to read his vitals.

“Dear god, your BP is dangerously low. Your heart rate is arrhythmic. You should be glad you’re even alive right now.” John scathed, biting back his pure enragement.

“Please. Don’t call n ambulance..... ‘M fine John... see?” Sherlock said as he stood up, but his legs gave out underneath him and he toppled to the floor with a loud thud.

“Right. You’re not going anywhere.” John picked Sherlock up off of the ground and carried him to his bedroom.

He pulled out a bucket from underneath the kitchen sink and placed it beside the unmade mess of Sherlock’s bed, with the limp man lying flat on his back.

“How could you?” John said, almost sobbing over the sight of his best mate nearly dead.

“I... It started with Mary.” Sherlock murmured, eyes avoiding John’s.

“Well, clearly she’s not here! Why are you doing this Sherlock? With that brilliant brain of yours, haven’t you got a single thought in your head?” John’s eyes were now steadily streaming hot tears down his face, dribbling onto his checked shirt.

“I didn’ want ‘t tell you the truth about her. I drugged m’self constn’ly and hid it from you.” He said, unable to cry but feeling a deep absence in his heart.

His words were still severely slurred but he was still able to think somewhat coherently.

The feeling of John angry at him was the worst feeling in the world. Even when Moriarty tried to paint his name in a bad light, and ruin his reputation, it didn’t even compare to the now-battlefield that is his bedroom.

This was a new feeling for Sherlock, who always called himself a sociopath. It was new to feel John’s anger. It was new to feel upset because John was both sad and angry, normally he’d be indifferent.

John walked closer to his bed, kneeling down to Sherlock, who felt oh so sleepy but couldn’t possibly ever rest.

“I would absolutely lose myself if I ever lost you, Sherlock. You are the best man I have ever known. I couldn’t possibly live with myself if you died on my watch.” John stared deeply into Sherlock’s absent gaze.

“John. I love you.” Sherlock said, his voice regaining some clarity.  
  
“What?” John said, face filling with a sharp pink flush and eyes widening at the sight of Sherlock before him.

“I’ve lov’d you for a long time. Since I met you at Bart’s. When I asked you Afghanistan or Iraq.” Sherlock turned his head to look at the ceiling above him.

“I knew I loved you when your limp stopped.” Sherlock said, returning his glass bottle green-blue eyes back to John.

“I... I love you too you bloody arse.” John said, as he held onto Sherlock’s robe and gave him a bear hug.

“No more drugs, please? For me?” John whispered, leaning his face closer to Sherlock’s.

“I promise.” Sherlock gave a goofy drugged up smile at John, eyes crinkling with crows feet and dimples deepening.

John pulled Sherlock into a long, deep and passionate kiss and ran his gun-calloused hands through Sherlock’s raven tresses.

“I love you, dickhead. We’re still going to the hospital though, and when we get back I’m flushing your drugs down the loo.”

Sherlock grumbled and put a pillow over his head.

“Yeah, yeah, I know.” John picked himself up from his knees and gazed upon Sherlock’s long and lean body lovingly before shutting off the lights and closing the door.

 

 

 

 


End file.
